


Settle For The Thrill

by drew



Series: The Immaculate Collection [3]
Category: Harry Potter - Rowling
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2002-08-14
Updated: 2002-08-14
Packaged: 2017-10-04 12:07:53
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 837
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29847
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/drew/pseuds/drew
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The sparrow falls.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Settle For The Thrill

> >   
> _  
> I traded fame for love  
> Without a second thought.  
> _   
> 
>>
>>>   
> -Madonna, "Drowned World/Substitute For Love"  
> 
>> 
>>   
> 

 

* * *

Marcus thinks sex with Oliver is just a little perfect. Rough when he needs it and smooth when it's at Oliver's insistence. Neither one has to insist for very long.

They don't see each other very often during the quidditch season, but sometime between postseason and preseason they meet, usually for the World Cup, and then fly back to Oliver's place on one broomstick. The conditions between them usually fade to silence, but it's a comfortable silence. None of this warm and fuzzy healing silence shit, but a silence where neither feels compelled to explain himself.

The first couple of days are usually spent reacquainting -- hands, necks, tongues. Tracing new scars and trading team stories. Oliver buys Marcus a Firebolt 5 when he's signed to the Wimbourne Wasps, even though the signing means a little less time together every year. The first night they're together is spent apart; a little holdover from Marcus' days of inferiority complexes and rivalry is the inability to sleep with someone in a place that's not his own. He usually overcomes it within a day, but not always. Last time it took two, and Oliver looked at him, hurt, when he said so.

This time Marcus gets it in one and the second night is sleeping together, bodies warm. Marcus still thinks it's cheesy, but Oliver's heartbeat affects him. It turns him on.

* * *

Marcus is always the one to tell Oliver he's ready; Oliver never pushes. Marcus sometimes gets mad at him. "You're so goddamn patient! Don't you ever _need_ anything?"

"I know it's coming, even if I don't know when." Oliver kisses Marcus. It's a temporary placation, and Marcus knows it, but he's so horny that he allows himself to be drawn in, to relish the physical interaction.

They have sex then, rough and then smooth, like two different kinds of peanut butter. When it's rough, Marcus leans into each thrust, wraps Oliver's legs around his own waist, attacks Oliver's mouth with his tongue. He tongues Oliver's ear and Oliver moans involuntarily. There's a quick laugh from both, an amusement remembered, before the return to intensity.

Oliver takes his time, slides into Marcus with the grace he exhibits on a broomstick. His mouth is everywhere at once and Marcus can't keep up. It's too much, too soon and Marcus is gone.

* * *

They never quite get domesticated, because quidditch boys fall prey to the same bad housekeeping habits posessed by other athletes. They rarely leave the house apart during offseason, choosing instead to watch wizard movies and duel in chess. Marcus is quite the strategist and Oliver loses the better part of a set in the first game.

They try the Muggle game Scrabble, but "alohomora" is just too many letters, and not a lot of points anyway. They get fed up with it quite soon and move on to more... interesting games. Games like "kiss me here".

They pass a few years this way, in perpetual uncertainty of what to call their relationship. Oliver, the burgeoning romantic, blushes but calls them a couple. Marcus would prefer "friends with benefits", but he knows that's not true. Grudgingly, he accedes to call Oliver "my boyfriend".

Harry Potter visits once, after his graduation from Hogwarts, and while he's telling Oliver about how Gryffindor crushed Slytherin in the Quidditch Cup, Marcus just stares quietly. As he's leaving, Harry whispers to Oliver, "you know you could do better." Oliver hits him then, right across the face. He's fuming.

"Don't you _ever_..." He can't even finish. Harry holds his eye.

"You know it's true," he says hopelessly, and then disapparates.

Oliver knows it's not true.

* * *

When Marcus's family is brought to trial for dealings with the late Voldemort, Oliver stands with him, comforts him. When they immediately turn their allegience to Lord Malfoy, Oliver draws Marcus away from the sides. Marcus can't just abandon his family, but Oliver gives him another way out. "So don't pick a side. Come with me." Marcus hesitates only a moment.

Oliver leaves the Cannons and Marcus leaves the Wasps. Oliver's fans try to find him. Marcus' don't. There is time and what a time it is. They make the most of it. Marcus has familial pangs and returns to London, only to find himself swept up in his family's politics. Oliver sends owls daily, but they all return, feathers singed and squawking with their messages still tied about their feet.

Oliver heavily returns to Hogwarts to teach Defense Against The Dark Arts eleven years after his graduation. One year and he's gone; Hogwarts keeps its record pristine. He turns up at the Ministry Of Magic, the last place he thought he'd end up, and is enlisted under protest as an Auror.

When he meets Marcus in the air in late December, there is nothing else he can do. He aches for the past with a gnawing at his heart and points his wand. The sparrow falls.


End file.
